Federal Judge Strikes Down Chicago Ban On Handgun Sales

A Federal District Court in Chicago has struck down the a provision of the Chicago code which provides that “”No Firearm May Be Sold, Acquired or Otherwise Transferred Within [Chicago], Except Through Inheritance.” The law was actually passed by the City of Chicago in response to the Court decisions in McDonald v. Chicago, in which the Supreme Court struck down what had already been one of the most restrictive handgun laws in the country. The new law included both the sales restrictions dealt with by the Court in the decision issued yesterday, and provisions that limit the possession of legal handguns inside the home which appear to strike at the very heart of the Heller decision. Those provisions appear to be part of a separate law suit, but the sales restrictions are, at least as far as Judge Edmond Chang, an Obama appointee who has sat on the Federal Bench since the end of 2010, is concerned completely unconstitutional:

CHICAGO — This city’s ban on gun shops violates the Constitution, a federal judge ruled on Monday, dealing the latest setback to politicians here who had put in place some of the nation’s strictest limits on firearms.

“The stark reality facing the city each year is thousands of shooting victims and hundreds of murders committed with a gun,” the judge, Edmond E. Chang, of Federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, wrote. “But on the other side of this case is another feature of government: certain fundamental rights are protected by the Constitution, put outside government’s reach, including the right to keep and bear arms for self-defense under the Second Amendment.”

The judge stayed his ruling, giving the city a chance to appeal, and said it could still enact regulations on the sale and transfer of weapons if they did not amount to a complete ban.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel strongly disagreed with the judge’s finding against the ban and directed the city’s lawyers to “consider all options to better regulate the sale of firearms within the city’s borders,” said Roderick Drew, a spokesman for the city’s law department.

Chicago, which has wrestled with gang-related violence and more killings in recent years than in the larger cities of New York and Los Angeles, had for decades banned handguns within city limits. But in 2010, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the city went too far, prompting leaders here to settle for new limits, including outlawing the sale of firearms in the city.

Several residents and an association of Illinois firearms retailers filed a lawsuit, leading to Judge Chang’s decision. “Chicago’s ordinance goes too far in outright banning legal buyers and legal dealers from engaging in lawful acquisitions and lawful sales of firearms,” the judge wrote, “and at the same time the evidence does not support that the complete ban sufficiently furthers the purposes that the ordinance tries to serve.”

Gun rights advocates said they hoped the ruling would send a message to Chicago and other cities setting similar limits. “Just because people live in Chicago doesn’t mean they’ve given up their rights,” said Richard Pearson, the executive director of the Illinois State Rifle Association. Even with Chicago’s ban on sales, officials have long complained about the patchwork of laws that allowed guns to be obtained in neighboring states and suburbs.

As Eugene Volokh notes, Chang relies heavily on the McDonald and District of Columbia v. Heller decisions, as well as Ezell v. City of Chicago, 651 F.3d 684, a 2011 decision from the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in which the Court had struck down a ban on gun ranges within Chicago’s city limits, in determining that the right protected by the Second Amendment includes not just the right to own such weapons, but, by definition, also the right to acquire those weapons:

The City argues in response that these ordinances do not ban acquisition, but merely regulate where acquisition may occur. Defs.’ Br. at 23. It is true that some living on the outskirts of the City might very well currently live closer to gun stores now than they would absent these ordinances. But Ezell makes clear that this type of argument “assumes that the harm to a constitutional right is measured by the extent to which it can be exercised in another jurisdiction. That’s a profoundly mistaken assumption.” 651 F.3d at 697. It was no answer there that plenty of gun ranges were located in the neighboring suburbs, or even right on the border of Chicago and the suburbs. Instead, the Seventh Circuit drew on First Amendment jurisprudence to reason that Second Amendment rights must be guaranteed within a specified geographic unit—be it a city or a State. See id. (“In the First Amendment context, the Supreme Court long ago made it clear that ‘one is not to have the exercise of his liberty of expression in appropriate places abridged on the plea that it may be exercised in some other place.'” (quoting Schad v. Borough of Mt. Ephraim, 452 U.S. 61, 76-77 (1981))).5

Indeed, this reasoning makes sense, because if all cities and municipalities can prohibit gun sales and transfers within their own borders, then all gun sales and transfers may be banned across a wide swath of the country if this principle is carried forward to its natural conclusion. Therefore, just as in Ezell, where the fact “[t]hat residents may travel outside the jurisdiction to fulfill the training requirement is irrelevant to the validity of the ordinance inside the City,” id. at 712 (Rovner, J., concurring in the judgment), so too here: the fact that Chicagoans may travel outside the City to acquire a firearm does not bear on the validity of the ordinance inside the City.

(…)

The City, however, does supply a reason: it contends that inner-city gang members and criminals find it hard to travel to the suburbs, thus making it more difficult for them or their likely straw purchasers to shop at gun stores. See DSOF ¶ 78. Dr. Philip Cook, one of the City’s experts, attributes this travel difficulty to the ”parochial[ism]” of gang members, and CPD Commander Gorman believes that making the trip to the suburbs is dangerous for gang members because they may have to cross rival gang boundaries both in Chicago and in the suburbs. Id. So through these ordinances, Chicago intentionally increases the distance that Chicagoans have to travel to get to gun stores in order to tack on extra transaction costs (measured in time, effort and danger) to any criminal attempt to buy guns. These extra transaction costs, the argument goes, deter would-be criminals from buying guns.

But these transaction costs are also borne by law-abiding residents of these neighborhoods, who are equally parochial and may suffer many of the same dangers by crossing into gang-infested territory. See Pls.’ Resp. DSOF ¶¶ 78-A, 78-B. So whatever burdens the City hopes to impose on criminal users also falls squarely on law-abiding residents who want to exercise their Second Amendment right. What’s more, it is doubtful that keeping criminal users away from legitimate retail stores will choke the supply of guns to those users. According to a survey of convicted felons proffered by the City itself, “[l]egitimate firearms retailers play a minor and unimportant role as direct sources of the criminal handgun supply.”

(…)

Thus, it is likely that residents who seek to legally buy a gun bear more of the share of the added transaction costs in time, effort, and danger than gang members or would-be criminals, who rarely buy guns from legitimate dealers directly. Given the close fit between justification and means that the City must demonstrate, it cannot justify its ban on legitimate gun sales and transfers with over inclusive means that impact more law-abiding citizens than criminals. And without a valid explanation for how its chosen means actually achieves its goal of reducing criminal access to guns, the City’s first justification fails

(…)

It is true that, with a sales-and-transfer ban, the Chicago police would not have to worry about investigating burglaries of gun dealers or devoting manpower to preventing those burglaries. But a blanket ban on all gun dealers to solve the burglary problem sweeps too broadly. To address the City’s concern that gun stores make ripe targets for burglary, the City can pass more targeted ordinances aimed at making gun stores more secure — for example, by requiring that stores install security systems, gun safes, or trigger locks …. Or the City can consider designating special zones for gun stores to limit the area that police would have to patrol to deter burglaries. Such regulations would be a far closer fit with the City’s desired goal of reducing burglaries at gun stores, as opposed to a blanket ban on the operation of all gun stores (even the most secure ones) within Chicago. The general danger that some gun stores may pose does not justify banning all gun sales and transfers within Chicago….

In sum, given the rigorous showing that Ezell demands, the City has not demonstrated that allowing gun sales and transfers within city limits creates such genuine and serious risks to public safety that flatly prohibiting them is justified.

On the whole, it seems to me that Judge Chang has gotten it pretty much correct here. Given the fact that the Supreme Court has recognized that, at the first least, the Second Amendment includes the right to keep a firearm in their home for self-defense, it seems absurd for the City of Chicago to say that they ought to be able to outright ban all sales of those handguns inside the city limits, including those conducted via a federally licensed firearms dealer such as the owner of any gun store must be. In his opinion, Judge Chang examines each of the arguments advanced by the City and finds, correctly it seems, that there are less restrictive means by which the goals that the city claims that it is concerned with can be achieved, This is expecially true given the fact, as Judge Chang notes, that most of the crime committed in the City of Chicago is committed using illegally acquired weapons and that criminals are highly unlikely to attempt to acquire their weapons via legitimate means like going to a local gun stores, because they are unlikely to be able to pass the criminal background check that would be necessary to complete such a transaction. Therefore, the only people who are really harmed by the ban are law abiding people in Chicago who desire to obtain a weapon for the purposes permitted by Heller and McDonald, and the people who wish to sell to them.

The next step for this case, of course, will be the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, where both Chicago and the State of Illinois have found their restrictive gun laws called into question in recent years, and, if it accepts the case, the Supreme Court if one side or the other chooses to take the case that far. Given that Chicago has not seen its gun laws fare well it Court in recent years, it seems rather obvious where this case is headed in this end.

Comments

Chicago will simply do what D.C. did and limit, down to the color scheme, those weapons that may be sold in Chicago. Chicago is not on the top of the list of places to go if you want to exercise freedom.

It probably is the correct ruling…but what you don’t mention is that gun violence in Chicago is at it’s lowest since the mid-sixties.
So the correct take-away is this; while this particular law may go too far…gun regulation does in fact work despite the claims of the gun cult…and it’s simply a matter of getting the appropriate balance…between the right to own a weapon…and the right of non-gun owners to be safe from those who own weapons.

I am a hard core gun safety law advocate, but I have to admit that the decision was correctly decided, given the legal framework Judge Chang had to work with. Its been plain since Heller and Mcdonald that blanket prohibitions on handguns were a no go. Chang’s holding does give some comfort for gun safety advocates, though:

In sum, given the rigorous showing that Ezell demands, the City has not demonstrated that allowing gun sales and transfers within city limits creates such genuine and serious risks to public safety that flatly prohibiting them is justified. If the City is concerned about reducing criminal access to firearms, either through legitimate retail transactions or via thefts from gun stores, it may enact more appropriately tailored measures. Indeed, nothing in this opinion prevents the City from considering other regulations—short of the complete ban—on sales and transfers of firearms to minimize the access of criminals to firearms and to track the ownership of firearms

Gun safety advocates can look to the NY case discussed earlier, where a robust gun safety legislative scheme was for the most part upheld. Chicago should look to the New York law as a template.

@Jack: And this having a gun somehow magically protects you from being shot in the head while you’re sleeping?

Look–I don’t mind if you have a gun. Provided, of course, that you demonstrate that you have the smarts to use it responsibly and correctly, don’t use it to terrorize people, aren’t dumb enough to leave it around loaded where a two-year old can get it, shoot it in the air, or all the other dumb things that so-called “law-abiding” gun owners do.

Oh, and you are responsible for the damage that your gun does. None of this “gee, I didn’t think the gun was loaded!” crap while trying to weasel out of shooting a neighbor, your wife, or your kid.

@Jack:
So you don’t subscribe to the whole life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness stuff?
I’ve said it before…when one of the parties is just flat out stupid…it’s hard to have a meaningful discussion.

@grumpy realist: Safety is a myth. But, preparation and planning, to include purchasing a firearm and learing to use it, can improve your odds when a situation turns ugly. Considering my inanimate object has yet to shoot unless I depressed the trigger, I would say I am using it correctly, but thanks for giving me the permission to own one and exercise my rights.

Frankly, I’m glad Jack is so honest. Let’s face it, its the logical conclusion to the gun cultists’ creed: everyone should own and carry a gun and if you get shot, it’s your own damned fault. You should have on you at all times a loaded gun capable of killing several attackers, and “situational awareness” even if you are going to church, your kid’s school, or the neighborhood coffee shop. That’s the gun cultists’ idea of the good society.

@stonetools:
Yeah, baby…saddle up for the wild, wild west.
Fire-fights in kindergartens and movie theaters.
Losers like Jack with no self esteem…sporting his penile prosthetic…shooting up a dark theater…good times!!!

@C. Clavin: You have no rights to any of those things, that is the Declaration of Independence, not the Bill of Rights. There is no right to life. If you don’t like living next to a gun owner, then move.

The law sounds draconian (and unconstitutional), but at least it had the right target (handguns, as opposed to the sideshow of “assualt weapons”). Statistically, hand guns are the problem (or, if you prefer, people using hand guns to commit crimes are the problem. The people commit the crimes. The gun helps).

As for Jack, ok buddy. Statistically, I’m a lot safer without a firearm than with one. Granted, I do not live in a bad neighborhood in Chicago. The calculus does get more interesting if you move me into a high crime area. This is why I don’t condemn gun ownership, full stop. However, it’s clear that being awash in guns boosts the rate (and severity) of violence we see, including violence to self – suicides.

I occasionally read Daily Kos’s weekly Gun Fail. I’m struck with how often the phrasing is a passive, “the gun fired”, “there was a round in the chamber”, “the gun fell to the floor and discharged”, or some such. Apparently in some circumstances gun owners do believe that guns kill people.

You have no rights to any of those things, that is the Declaration of Independence, not the Bill of Rights. There is no right to life. If you don’t like living next to a gun owner, then move.

Heh, someone has not read their Fifth Amendment. In any case, there is another option to moving, which is to work with others pass a rational gun safety scheme in harmony with the Supreme Court decisions. I’m living in Virginia, which is a long way away from passing such legislation, but we are getting bluer every year, as sensible people move in and as the old timers die off. Maybe in next generation….

Last time I checked, the studies were inconclusive and, therefore, I draw the same basic conclusion: that gun control (at least as we’ve done it) hasn’t had a measureable impact on crime. There are a lot of confounding factors in play.

The issue is surely at least partly cultural (and law typically follows culture). There is a glorification of violence and of guns in particular. This is more true in certain communities than in others. Add in different employment rates, demographics (% of pop that is young and male) and such, and you get the wildly variable violent crime rates in this country.

The other truth is that our efforts at gun control have typically been localized and that makes it hard to really evaluate. Chicago might have strict laws, but if Indiana or Wisconsin or Iowa have lax ones, it complicates things. The last federal-level law was a joke.

@stonetools: The 5th says the government may not deny…. It says nothing about having a right to life. I too live in Virginia and we have and will have for a long time to come the best laws (or lack of laws) there are. I can buy practically any weapon I want through an FFL, I don’t have to go through an FFL for a private sale, I can open carry or conceal carry even on government property. Police cannot stop me just because they see my gun or someoone is “alarmed” and demand I prove I can own said gun. I love it here.

@Rob in CT:
Well…if you look at Mass…it’s working.
Chicago…lowest gun violence rates in almost 50 years.
You are correct though…there are indeed confounding factors.
First and foremost is the federal law against spending federal money to study gun violence.

@Tylerh: Hollow points are intended to increase stopping power. Most ball ammunition simply passes through the target but does not stop them. Talk to our soldiers who by law cannot use hollow points about how well the M16 with ball ammunition stops said target. In short, they will say it passes through and the target continues to advance.

@C. Clavin: The city of Chicago registered more homicides than any city in the nation in 2012, surpassing even New York — despite the fact that the Second City has only one third as many residents as the Big Apple.

A U.S. Justice Department study based on crime data from 1974-1985 found:
• 42% of Americans will be the victim of a completed violent crime (assault, robbery, rape) in the course of their lives
• 83% of Americans will be the victim of an attempted or completed violent crime
• 52% of Americans will be the victim of an attempted or completed violent crime more than once[24]

@Jack: People like you give gun owners a bad name. Scared to death to walk out your door with out a gun because you don’t have the guts to face the world as a man, just a man, because you’re not a man, and in your heart of hearts, you know it.

@stonetools: We are a growing movement. We are no longer just Fudds and beer drinking hillbillys. Responsible gun owners are all inclusive. We carry for the protection of ourselves and our loved ones. The government has said it is not responsible for our safey, therefore we have become responsible for our safety.

The future I look forward to is open season on liberals trying to limit our rights–with no bag limit.

@C. Clavin: It was from the “Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy”. Who else do you think publishes from Harvard but the students and professors? I guess since it doesn’t have teh Dean’s signature block it must not be affiliated with Harvard.

Meanwhile the Police Chief in Detroit says private gun ownership is good and helps reduce crime.

People are obsessed with guns in Detroit, and yet Detroit is hardly the model of a safe community.

• 42% of Americans will be the victim of a completed violent crime (assault, robbery, rape) in the course of their lives
• 83% of Americans will be the victim of an attempted or completed violent crime
• 52% of Americans will be the victim of an attempted or completed violent crime more than once[24]

And those statistics provide no indication of whether or not those crime victims were in places where guns are abundant, or whether or not the possession of a gun by the victim would have made any difference at all.

@Jack: That’s not a study so much as a literature review (think “research paper on steroids”). It has value as far as being a collection and analysis of relevant studies, but there’s no original research in it.

@C. Clavin: Being as it’s a lit review and not a primary research study, peer review wouldn’t apply. The authors are collecting published data and providing their own analysis; other authors might reach different conclusions.

Jack refers to all kinds of “studies” and statements yet provides links to none of them . I wonder why…
Meanwhile, the gun lobby has done an excellent job of prohibiting the Center for Disease Control from carrying out studies related to gun violence, since the studies they did showed that guns indeed contribute to higher violence and homicide rates. It’s almost as if they don’t want scientific studies of gun ownership and gun violence…

@stonetools: There is no such thing as gun violence anymore than there is automobile violence when a drunk driver kills an innocent family. I have what many here would definately say qualifies as an arsenal, yet none of them have ever killed anyone.

Here is a plan that would work and would also be constitutional. Instead of laws that try to limit gun sales and move the gun stores out of the city, how about moving the gang members, criminals, bank robbers, and other violent people out of town. This would solve the problem instead of punishing law abiding citizens who want to buy a firearm.

@Tyrell:
there you go again…assuming your 2nd amendment rights trump every other right of every other person.
Like I said…you can’t have a meaningful discussion when the other side insists on being stupid.

OK, I’m a loser. With a happy wife, 13 acres, a nice house, 2 trucks, 2 cars, a tractor, 7 guns, 2 boats, etc etc and all of it paid for. As such I’m still not a ‘fraidy cat who feels any need whatsoever for concealed carry.

To me, the problem is not gun ownership, but the fact that so many gun proponents are obsessed with things like crime and think that they should have functions that should be exercised by the cops. I would not mind someone owning guns next to me, but living next to some neighborhood watch that wants to play cop would probably be a nightmare.

@Jack: And this is why we want to make certain that would-be gun owners are responsible people before allowing them to get their hands on weapons that would kill other members of society.

Your comments, in my opinion, remove you from the responsible class. Threats are not funny. Replace “liberal” in your comments by “blacks”, “Jews”, or any other class and your expressed hatred would be seen for what it is.

And if you don’t mean your comments and they are “just a joke”, why are you making them?

@C. Clavin: Funny story: When MO got concealed carry I opened up the STL Post Disgrace the day after they first started taking apps and who’s photo should I see gracing the front page as the first person in the STL area to apply for one? THE LAST PERSON IN THE WORLD ANYONE WOULD WANT WALKING AROUND WITH A LOADED WEAPON. I had known that particular individual for years and he was a walking talking example of every reason why I was so against concealed carry. He hasn’t killed anyone yet but everyday I scan the news and expect to his mug-shot.

Recently I saw a statement something like “If Guns Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Will Have Guns”.
I have been thinking about that, and it seems to make a lot of sense. It seems that in all of the recent gun control talk of the last few years, there is the tendency to put restrictions on law abiding citizens instesd of criminals, gang members, dope pushers, and other violent law breakers. Law abiding citizens should not have their right to gun ownership further resticted. The problem is that most violent crimes are committed by career criminals who are usually let go time and again by soft on crime judges, often on some technicality. That is where a lot of the problem is, not with the law abiding people who want to buy a gun, whether for protection, hunting, sport (targetry), or collections.

there is the tendency to put restrictions on law abiding citizens instesd of criminals, gang members, dope pushers, and other violent law breakers.

really? you’ve never heard of laws?

Law abiding citizens should not have their right to gun ownership further resticted

Why not? We abridge every single right. Why not guns?

The problem is that most violent crimes are committed by career criminals who are usually let go time and again by soft on crime judges, often on some technicality.

Got a link? Actually, most gun deaths are suicides. And what about domestic violence?

That is where a lot of the problem is, not with the law abiding people who want to buy a gun, whether for protection, hunting, sport (targetry), or collections.

The problem is this myth of the law-abiding gun owner. Like the lady in Conn who let her mentally disabled kid get to her guns. Or the guy that shoots his kid because he didn’t know there was one in the chamber. Or the mother that lets her kid get a hold of a gun…and the kids shoots his sister in the face.
Again…let them have their guns. But require background checks and serious training. Common sense steps that do not infringe on anyone’s rights. You know…like a well-regulated militia.

The restrictions on gun purchases is a lot like the restriction on abortions — an effort to make sure that although you may have a right, you have no ability to actually exercise that right.

Which is why I support dual purpose gun shops and abortion clinics, and requiring that anyone who provides one service must also provide the other. Would Texas be so willing to restrict gun purchases to a handful of places in the state? Would New York be willing to limit a woman’s right to abortion to the degree they want to limit guns?

@C. Clavin: But require background checks and serious training. Common sense steps that do not infringe on anyone’s rights. You know…like a well-regulated militia. Those are infringements.

While I urge every new gun owner to get training, and I have no problem with NICS checks through FFLS, you cannot mandate training to exercise a right anymore than you can tax people to vote. I would love to make sure everyone passed a civics test before voting, but the USSC frowns on stuff like that.

As of November 25, the city had recorded 377 murders, a 20% decline from the 472 that occurred last year by this time. It’s the fewest to date of any year since 1965, according to Chicago police. The total number of shootings and shooting victims is also dramatically down. There have been 692 fewer shooting victims, 2,148 this year compared to 2,840 during the same time period in 2012. And shootings are down by 562, from 2,261 to 1,699.

So contrary to your claim…it is working.
I can only assume…that confronted with the facts…that you will change you mind on the topic.
No? I didn’t think so. That would take courage and integrity.
All you have is a gun.

@C. Clavin: It’s still 3 times that of NY with 1/3 the population. What they were doing isn’t working. Get back to me after a full year with concealed carry and gun purchases in Chicago lawful. If the numbers haven’t changed then I will say I was wrong.

@Jack:
You are the one that needs to take a civics class you moron.
Regulations are not infringements. I’m pretty sure every single right is regulated.
The term “regulated” in fact means “disciplined” or “trained”. In Heller, the U.S. Supreme Court stated that:

“the adjective ‘well-regulated’ implies nothing more than the imposition of proper discipline and training.”

So much for;

As far as the well regulated argument, it’s been debunked already.

Likely debunked by the same authors that aren’t from Harvard that you linked to before.
Like I said…you can’t have a meaningful discussion with cult members.
I stated at the top of this…there needs to be a balance.
Nut-jobs like you aren’t interested in balance.
You are only interested in your gun and threatening others with it.

@C. Clavin: You are exactly right, well regulated means trained or properly functioning. IT DOES NOT mean let’s put a bunch of regulations on a right.

I am fine with balance. Compromise means give and take. The liberals only want us gun owners to give but will never give anything back. I used to be able to buy a gun through the Sears and Roebuck’s catalog. Now I can’t. I didn’t used to have a check with every gun I bought, now I do. We have given in to “common sense” laws, yet don’t get anything in return. You want universal background checks, fine. Give us reciprocity nationwide for our CCW permits. Due to my job and my permits I’ve arguably undergone more background/security checks than anyone on this board and definitely more than any cop in NYC or Chicago, yet I cannot carry there.

@Jack: So if there is no right to life, you won’t mind if your neighbors get together and “take care” of someone in their neighborhood who packs firepower and demonstrates acute lack of safety awareness?

By the way, there’s a large number of people who, when upon asking about why they ended up shooting their kid/wife/dog/whatever, come out with some version of “the gun went off.” It seems that they, at least, seem to believe in metallic animus.

Honestly, why don’t you Second Amendment types scream bloody murder about the idiots in your midst?

@grumpy realist: Yeah, see. About that….”taking care of” someone who is doing no harm to them, would be illegal. That has nothing to do with the “right” to life.

I don’t condone negligent discharges. Note I didn’t say accidental. I’ve said that I urge all new gun owners to get training. The four rules require at least 2 of them to be broken for there to be a negligent discharge. “They” say the gun went off because they don’t want to take responsibility for violating 2 of the rules and shooting someone/something.

@al-Ameda: Thieves don’t normally live in good neighborhoods and a B&E in the bad neighborhoods will not net you much. Therefore they go to the good neighborhoods. That’s where the B&E, car theft, etc., take place. That’s where guns are also needed when the good guy happens to be home. Asking a thief politely to leave rarely results in the thief leaving and could be an invitation for a beatdown. Yet a .45 pointed center mass will get the same result every time.

Thieves don’t normally live in good neighborhoods and a B&E in the bad neighborhoods will not net you much.

Well, most of the homicide activity in Chicago seems to be happening in “bad” neighborhoods, and not in affluent or middle class neighborhoods in the city. The same is true in San Francisco, Oakland, Philadelphia, Detroit, Los Angeles, Houston or Dallas – just to name a few metro areas.

There was little point to banning sales in Chicago when you could go just outside the city limits to buy guns, not to mention the gun trafficking corridor from the South that arms the gangs.

And no, our gun laws were not working to stem gun violence in this city. 2013 was an improvement, but the gun laws were on the books for a long time before that, and some were actually repealed before 2013 after McDonald.

@grumpy realist: There was a time during the Vietnam War when a man said that”If they ever make me carry a rifle the first man I want to get in my sights is L. B. J.” He was arrested and the court said it was protected speech. “But whatever the “willfullness” requirement implies, the statute initially requires the Government to prove a true “threat.” We do not believe that the kind of political hyperbole indulged in by petitioner fits within that statutory term.” I know what is legal and what is not.

Look whacking Jack around is interesting in the way pushing a stick in an ants nest is interesting, but let’s face it, there’s not much intelligent discussion to be had there. The Judge was pretty clear, although Doug skimmed over that part of his holding: most types of regulation short of an out right ban would be permitted by the court.
That means that Chicago could do any of the following:

1. require the buyer undergo a background check.
2. require that the buyer have one or more persons vouch for the buyer’s good character.
3. require that the buyer complete a gun safety course.
4. require that the gun be registered with the authorities

I frankly would require that a potential buyer in Chicago do all of these things, but Chicago has the flexibly to require any, all or none of the above.
NOw frankly this might not help all that much if the criminals can go to agun show in a neighboring jurisdiction and buy a number of guns, no questions asked, but all CChicago can do is their best.
Eventually, people will see the gun issue the way people do in the rest of the world: as a public health issue. Until, then , we’ll see disparities like this:

@Jack:
While you are not legally threatening anyone and would probably not actually shoot liberals if it were somehow legal, though you would probably buy a licence because you found it funny, you are being a douche by saying bullshit like that. You have every right to be a douche, but when you are a douche you will be treated like a douche and no one will take even your reasonable points seriously.

@Jack: @Grewgills: I was simply responding to the vitriol that was being flung my way. If you haven’t noticed, I also had reasonable discussions with those that were reasonable with me. But it seems no matter how reasonable I was, I was called a pussy, a loser with no self esteem…sporting his penile prosthetic, stupid, and gun cultist to name a few. So I returned insults with insults, why should I be any more above the fray than my liberal overlords.

@OzarkHillbilly: that movie features a gun that when shot by it, gives the person an orgasm. my kinda weapon.

@mantis: As a gun owner, I never understood why so many gun owners cant grasp the concept that guns make a lot of people nervous, especially in public. You’re not seen as some sort of protector/defender of rights so much as a person to be suspicious about…which is why i leave my guns at home and locked up, where they belong.

@T: T, 30 years ago a mixed race or gay couple couldn’t walk down the street hand in hand because it made a lot of people nervous and likely invited a beatdown in many cities.

While I don’t support the “in your face” approach of those armed with rifles going into the local library or Starbucks”, open/concealed carry of a pistol is becoming more mainstream simply because more people are doing it.

In my opinion, a handgun at home will not help you if attacked outside of the home.

open/concealed carry of a pistol is becoming more mainstream simply because more people are doing it.

I think that may be a case of viewer’s perspective. I am by no means rabidly anti-gun, but the one thing guaranteed to send me complaining to managers and calling the police is someone bringing a gun around me or my children in public. I can’t say that I know anybody else who feels any differently. What you do in your home is one thing, but when you bring it around me in public, it becomes my problem. I think you are grossly overestimating other people’s comfort levels in that regard.

@Jack: “But it seems no matter how reasonable I was, I was called a pussy, a loser with no self esteem…sporting his penile prosthetic, stupid, and gun cultist to name a few. So I returned insults with insults, why should I be any more above the fray than my liberal overlords.”

Boy, your life is really hard. You should relax, maybe shoot a couple of people to make yourself feel better. After all, you own guns, and that gives you the right.

Heck, if you do it in the south, just target a couple of young black guys. You’ll walk — and you’ll probably even get people to send you money so you can pay your bail when you beat up your girlfriend later.

And listen, if they didn’t deserve to die, they wouldn’t be in the way of your bullets, right? Your bullets have the right to go wherever you want them to. The second amendment says that, and it’s the only amendment that counts.

I mean, what’s the world coming to when you can’t casually insinuate that you look forward to shooting down your political opponents in the streets? Man, this PC business sure has ruined America!

Unfortunately, I’ve run into a real-life co-worker who has these fantasies about shooting a home intruder. The fantasy he has is utterly absurd. He lives in Mass, so for him it’s all about whining about how he’s not allowed to act out his fantasy.

He’s slightly nicer than Jack, I’ll give him that. But then that’s face-to-face and we all know people tend to be a little nicer face-to-face.